


Dissolving Contrails

by HighWarlockMegaraBane



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's
Genre: Breakup, M/M, Timeskip, hints of all sorts of past ships, hints of the boys giving a crap about each other, mostly angst, not a lot of fluff, yusei is dark and mysterious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-26
Packaged: 2019-07-29 04:13:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16256432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HighWarlockMegaraBane/pseuds/HighWarlockMegaraBane
Summary: During Yusei's duel with Dark Signer Kalin, Crow and Jack see each other for the first time in years. It's fleeting and only lasts a second, but it brings back so many memories and feelings that each have tried to suppress.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in one sitting so if there's mistakes don't attack meeee

Crow worried his lower lip, looking down at the two duelists standing in the outline of the Earthbound Immortal. He kept his helmet on, tapped into the audio playing over the headset.

               Whatever Kalin said next was drowned out by a sudden roar behind him. Crow spun on a heel, startled to see a helicopter pitching wildly down towards him—with someone hanging out the side.

               He screeched and stumbled back. It pulled up just before it reached the tailpipe of Blackbird but Crow suddenly got a full view of the man hanging out the door as the helicopter swung away.

               And his heart stopped.

               “Jack?” he called, almost desperately as he took a step toward the copter that was spinning out of reach. He jerked off his helmet and tried to call out again, but the name caught in his throat and he ended up mouthing the word.

               “Crow!” he shouted back, the shock evident on every line of his chiseled features. That was the end of their interaction, as by this point the helicopter was far too high to warrant any more communication. Crow’s helmet fell from his limp hand and clattered to the junk pile beneath his feet.

               “Jack,” he said softly. He couldn’t tear his gaze away from the helicopter, which now seemed to be making a wide circle around the outline on the ground. One of his hands found the back of his neck. “Jesus Christ.”

               The last time Crow had seen Jack, he had been fourteen. That felt like eons ago now. It was right after… Ironically, right after Kalin was arrested. He remembered hearing that Jack had gone to the city, and not long after that Jack Atlas, the master of faster, the sultan of speed, had begun appearing on the TV in his hideout.

               Crow had resented him for a long time, especially after what they’d had. Of course, he probably should have seen the downhill slope their relationship began to track. It all began with the dissolving of The Enforcers.

 

_Crow groaned, knotting a hand in Jack’s hair as the blonde kissed his chest, trailing his lips down his sternum as his hands worked on his belt._

_“Jesus, Jack,” he exhaled. His neck hurt from where it was lined with bite marks and his lips were swollen and raw, indented with marks from Jack’s teeth. “You’re not—wasting any time.”_

_Jack paused. This wasn’t something he did often. Jack was always so direct and to the point. Pausing wasn’t something that was in his nature. His breath was hot against Crow’s abdomen and V-line. His hands stopped where they had Crow’s jeans and boxers settled low on his hips._

_“Did we do the right thing?”_

_Crow raised his head, the heat in his crotch distracting him. Jack seemed to be distracted in another direction, though, as he refused to meet Crow’s eyes._

_“What do you mean?” he asked, propping himself up on his elbows._

_“With Kalin. We left him and Yusei,” Jack replied. “We promised we’d all work together, and…”_

_“Jack, you know as well as I do that Kalin’s on a fast track to failure,” Crow stated, cocking an eyebrow. They had left the leader and their brother not even a week ago, and this had gone unspoken between them since. From the window of their hideout, you could see the tip of the Daedalus Bridge poking at the sky, over the ocean, and then, a smudge in the distance, New Domino City. Crow had woken up alone every morning, and every morning he had found Jack standing at the window, staring out at the city._

_“The only reason Yusei stayed is because he’s loyal to a fault,” he continued. He was beginning to think he wasn’t going to get laid tonight. “Kalin’s going to do something bad and if we stuck around he was going to take us down with him.”_

_Jack sat up. “But what about Yusei? We just…left him too.”_

_Crow exhaled slowly. Jack was right, of course. But they hadn’t prevented Yusei from joining them; he had stayed of his own volition. He had stayed to try to protect Kalin. He had stayed to keep him sane. He had stayed for reasons that Crow, thirteen, couldn’t even begin to understand._

_“Yusei will be okay,” Crow tried to insist, but it sounded weak to his own ears. “He’s always been the strongest of us.”_

_“No one can be strong against Kalin.” Jack rose out of bed and paced to the window. Looking at the skyline. Looking at the damned city._

_Crow followed him, haphazardly buckling his pants back. He came up behind Jack. “What are you looking at?” he asked as if he didn’t already know._

_Jack sighed. “Look at it. It looks so small. It’s so far away and it looks so small. But it’s not. New Domino is a whole other world.”_

_Crow peered at the skyline, at the looping highways circling the city. He imagined he could see cars vibrating along the roads, see the people inside them living their high-rise city lives, ignorant and blissfully so of the struggles in the Satellite. He raised a hand and extended his thumb, closing one eye. His thumb blotted the city out entirely. It was so easy to pretend it wasn’t there. So easy to pretend it didn’t affect him. So easy to pretend it wasn’t affecting Jack._

_“What if we went there?” Jack said, very quietly. Crow looked up, startled._

_“Went to the city?” he echoed. “We can’t, Jack. We’re here. This is our home and this is our life, and this is what we have to deal with.”_

_Jack was silent. A cold fear gripped Crow’s ribs, one that wouldn’t ever leave but would slowly turn into hate, hate and anger, because those were so much easier to deal with than fear and loneliness._

_“You won’t—leave, will you?” he asked in a small voice. His heart thrummed a military beat against his ribs, loud enough that he was sure Jack could hear it, feel it in the way their fingers brushed. When Jack didn’t say anything, Crow put his arms around the taller boy’s middle, pressing his face into his chest. “Jack?” he asked into the fabric of his shirt._

_“No,” he said softly, his hand cupping the back of Crow’s neck. “No, I won’t leave you.” But his eyes never left the skyline._

 

“Jack, do you know them?” Carly asked from behind him, her voice high and startled. Jack still struggled to catch his breath, wide eyes fixed on the orange-haired teen staring after him, mouth moving in what was undoubtedly his name.

               “Crow,” he whispered. “A…long time ago, Carly. We were all in a dueling team together. Kalin, Yusei, and…Crow and I.”

               _Crow and I. Crow and I._ That was a sentence Jack hadn’t thought in a long time. Three simple words that hadn’t crossed his mind in nearly three years. _Crow and I_. It sounded foreign, tasted funny, like a dish one hasn’t had since childhood and had forgotten about, but someone from home would cook it and when tasted it would feel so familiar and warm and safe.

               “But that was forever ago,” Carly replied.

               _Forever_. There’s another word that tasted funny. This one stabbed Jack in the back of the neck, in his stomach, between his shoulder blades and through to his lungs and his heart. Jack was afraid to say it, afraid of how it would hurt his insides.

               “Yes, I suppose it was,” he said. He closed his eyes, thought back to that time three years ago, when he was sixteen.

 

_Jack rose out of bed again, before Crow. Yusei was without a doubt asleep on the couch in the main room. That was fine—the bedroom window held the city skyline as well._

_Kalin had been arrested a month prior. Yusei had recently moved in with them after wandering around in Satellite on his own, wrapped up in his own grief for three weeks. They finally found each other again, and Crow had convinced Yusei to move in with them indefinitely._

_Jack wondered how long it would last. Yusei never liked staying in one place for too long. Frankly, he was surprised the dark-haired boy hadn’t left yet. Yusei was as free-spirited as his namesake—a spiraling star cluster, spinning and changing and fleeing into the sky every morning, only to peek back at a distance the next night._

_A warm hand gripped Jack’s wrist, startling him out of his thought train. He turned and saw Crow, naked lower half wrapped up in the blankets as he leaned across the bed. The marker on his forehead stood out in the half-light of dawn._

_“Stay,” he whispered, voice sleep-roughened and weak. His gray eyes were wide. “Please.”_

_“I won’t be long,” he said, pulling his hand free. Crow’s lip trembled and his grey eyes shut hard._

_“Don’t leave,” he whimpered. He looked back up, eyes full of tears. “Jack.”_

_“I’ll be back.” Jack leaned down and kissed Crow’s forehead. “What are you so afraid of, blackbird?”_

_Crow shook his head hard. Jack took his cheek in the palm of one hand._

_“Hush, Crow,” he said softly, kissing him on the lips. “Don’t cry. I’ll be back before you know I’m gone. Lay back down now—go on back to sleep.”_

_Crow still looked upset but lay down regardless, turning his back and curling up with a pillow to his chest. Jack watched him for a moment before turning away and walking out of the room. He was suddenly unwilling to stay in the stiflingly hot bedroom._

_The couch was empty, as if Jack’s thoughts had willed it to be. He was ready to accept that Yusei was gone before he heard shuffling in the makeshift kitchen. Jack wandered in, curious._

_“Hey,” Yusei said quietly, holding a cup full of some steaming thing. “Want some coffee?”_

_“Where’d you get coffee?” Jack asked._

_“I traded for it about a week ago. Been saving it.” His blue eyes were fixed on a spot past his cup, unseeing. “Figured now is as good a time as any.”_

_Jack used hot water to make himself a cup, reusing the grounds Yusei had used. Coffee was a luxury they couldn’t afford to waste. His was probably a little weaker than Yusei’s and a little weaker than what he would like, but he was glad to have something warm in his hands._

_“What’s bothering you, Yusei?” he asked._

_“Kalin thought it was me,” he said quietly. His hands shook on the chipped coffee cup. It was one Crow had found in the junkyard, a heavy ceramic cup that said ‘World’s Best Boss’ on it. Crow had been unsure of what it said, but Jack had gotten a laugh out of it._

_“He thought what was you?” Jack inquired. “Security?”_

_“He saw me talking to the officers,” Yusei replied. “He thought it was me who ratted him out. He swore revenge on me. Promised me he’d make me pay. Called me a traitor.”_

_“You did the right thing,” Jack insisted. “Kalin was off his rocker. He was going to hurt more people.”_

_Yusei nodded slowly. “I…I guess you’re right.”_

_“Of course I’m right,” Jack quipped haughtily. “I’m always right.”_

_The other boy looked at him. “I’m going to leave.”_

_Jack wasn’t surprised. “I know.”_

_“You do?”_

_Jack nodded. “You were never one to hang around. Honestly, I’m surprised you haven’t left before this.” He looked away, out the window. At the skyline. “I won’t stop you.”_

_“You’ll stay, won’t you?”_

_He turned back. “I’m sorry?”_

_Yusei had a new fervor burning in his eyes. “For Crow. He needs someone. If I leave you have to promise me you’ll stay until he doesn’t need you anymore.”_

_Jack opened his mouth, suddenly compelled to tell Yusei about his desire to go to the city. He would understand, he_ had to _understand, he was_ born there _, he had to feel the same pull that Jack felt. None of the words that Jack wanted would come. So he closed his mouth again._

_“So why don’t you stay with him if you’re so worried?” he asked instead._

_“Crow doesn’t want me,” Yusei said, shaking his head. He took a sip of his coffee. “He wants you. I’ve always been second-best to you.”_

_For some reason, that hurt him. Didn’t it matter what Jack wanted? What if he wanted better for himself? But if it would make Yusei happy—he always wanted Yusei to be happy. Yusei had so much potential, and he was squandering it here. He squandered it padding about after Kalin for as long as he did, he squandered it wandering around Satellite alone. He was squandering it laying on the couch in the front room feeling sorry for himself._

_And now Jack’s rival, the only one smart enough to understand the Atlas mind, was willing to take a selfish step and do something for himself for once in his life. Who was Jack to stop him?_

_“I promise,” he said quietly. “I’ll stay until he doesn’t need me.”_

_Yusei nodded curtly. “Good.” He rose to his feet. “I’m going to find Nervin, Blitz, Tank, and Rally. They’re living on the east side. If you need to find me—that’s where I’ll be.”_

_Jack hesitated. “You’re—leaving right now?”_

_Yusei turned away. “I can’t wait any longer.” He grabbed his jacket from the table and slung it on. “I’ll see you around, Jack. Tell Crow…” He hesitated, and without another word he walked away._

_Jack watched him go until the door closed behind him. Once the door closed, he looked back out at the skyline. The sun was rising over New Domino._

_Two weeks later, Jack followed Yusei, leaving in the same manner. Crow woke up alone, not for the first time nor the last but for the time that hurt his heart the most. And that was the day that the fear in his stomach solidified into hate and resentment, and the day he told himself he didn’t need his brothers anyway._

 

And now here they were, close enough to see each other for the first time in three years. They were so different. Crow had been marked at least three more times. He was older, stronger, taller, confident in a way he never was with Jack around. Jack, recently dethroned and knocked down a few pegs, felt like they could see each other as equals now.

               _There is no ‘Crow and I’ anymore,_ Jack realized. _I hurt him. He must hate me. And I don’t blame him. I would hate me too._

               He turned his attention back to Kalin and Yusei, whose Runners had taken off at breakneck speed. _Crow and I are in the past. There’s Crow, and there’s Jack Atlas, and that’s just how it’s going to have to be. It’s not about what I want. It’s never been about what I wanted. I took what I wanted once and I ruined what we had. It doesn’t matter what I want anymore._

 

 _He doesn’t want me,_ Crow thought angrily, straddling his Runner and punching the screen with a little more force than necessary, pulling up the duel statistics. _If he wanted me, he would have stayed. Well, that’s fine. I don’t want him either. Who would want an arrogant jackass like him?_

               Crow backhanded his eyes, pretending he didn’t see the wetness on his glove. _I don’t want him. He and I are done and that’s how it’s been for years—that’s how it’s going to continue to be. I don’t want him. I don’t…_


	2. Chapter 2

The Dark Signers were defeated, and Crow and Jack stood face-to-face.

               They had first run into each other right before the battle with Goodwin, but they hadn’t had any time to talk. Now, standing on the shore of Satellite, they couldn’t take their eyes off each other. Each, although neither would admit it, was desperate to memorize the other's features, terrified of never seeing them again, terrified of being apart again.

               Yusei had been talking, half to himself, but stopped when he noticed that neither boy was listening to him. He looked between them and seemed to sense the tension.

               “I’ve, ah…got to use the restroom,” he excused, jerking a thumb over his shoulder. “I’ll be back—in a few.” He strode off, pausing only once to look over his shoulder at the two boys.

               “You look well,” Crow said. His voice was carefully even, trying to mask the shaking in his hands. “Guess your time at the top did wonders for you.”

               “You’ve—been marked again,” Jack noted, instinctively reaching out. Crow flinched, and Jack quickly moved his hand to the back of his neck, as if that were his whole intention. “Did you stop being careful?”

               “After the first one, the rest don’t hurt as much,” he replied. It was a lie, of course—but at least from then on he knew what to expect. Crow reached up and felt the skin on his cheek, where it was tight under his marking, like a heavy-handed tattoo. “Besides, it’s not like it matters.”

               Jack cursed himself silently. Crow was right—he had no reason to worry about his well-being. Being around the younger boy just pulled the protective, doting side out of his cold exterior. Jack cleared his throat awkwardly and turned to face the skyline. It was black and jagged against the slowly lightening sky.

               “You’re the only one of us who hasn’t been to the city,” he commented instead.

               “Not like I want to,” Crow snorted, crossing his arms. “I’ve got the kids here. You and Yusei belong over there, anyway. I wouldn’t be anything but out of place.”

               “Yusei was talking about getting an apartment over there,” Jack said. “You could come live with us.”

               “Are you even listening, jackal?” Crow snapped. “I’ve got my kids! I can’t just _leave_ them!”

               “You could take them to Martha’s,” Jack suggested, smiling faintly at the return of Crow’s old spark. “I think Yusei would want you to live with us.”

               “I think Yusei could bite me,” Crow muttered, but his resolve seemed to be wavering. There was a long pause and then he asked, very softly, “Is it like we imagined it would be?”

               Jack knew exactly what he was talking about. During some of their long nights, they would lay together looking at the lights on the skyline and playing that they lived there. They would adopt different personas and pretend to go about their high-rise lives until they were both crying from laughter. A place where people drove Duel Runners and real working cars from home to work every day. A place where duel cards could be bought instead of stolen from junk yards. A place where when you saw someone on the street you smiled and waved, you didn’t tuck your chin and speed up your walk. A place where the skies were blue, not smoggy gray.

               “It’s a lot like that, yeah,” Jack replied quietly. “There’s a lot of darkness over there, though. It’s not blatant, like it is here. It’s all hidden and tucked back in alleyways and dark corners. It’s almost scarier that way.”

               Crow pressed his teeth into his lower lip. “Then why’d you stay?”

               “I couldn’t leave,” Jack replied, putting his hands in his pockets. “I was the champion. If I just up and disappeared, they’d have a right riot on their hands.”

               “Yusei up and left.”

               “Yusei also wasn’t the most popular champion when he beat me,” he chuckled with a shrug. “Not only was he marked, he showed up from Satellite and dethroned the champion who had reigned for years. He’s more popular now but not near as liked as I am.” Jack paused. "As I was."

               They fell silent for another moment, Crow worrying his lower lip in his teeth as he watched the waves slap the shoreline, before Jack decided to poke at the elephant in the room.

               “Do you hate me?”

               _No._ Crow wanted to say the word. He wanted to tell Jack that he didn’t hate him, that quite the opposite, he still _loved him_ , still wanted to be with him. He wanted to cry, to throw himself into Jack’s arms and be held by that strong body again, feel Jack’s lips on his and his fingers in his hair. He wanted to lose himself in Jack’s touch and his smell and his taste, and not think about anything else ever again.

               “I did, for a long time.” Crow looked down at his crossed arms. “I woke up alone, and I figured you had just gone out for a walk, and that you’d be back. I…I thought like that for a year.”

               Jack’s heart began to pound. His vision blurred and he felt _immensely_ guilty. He had left and yes, he had thought about Crow, but once he fell into his dynamic with Yusei and the others, he had forgotten the other. It had been so much easier to forget him than to dwell on the feelings he still had. It had been so much easier to forget than to feel guilty.

               “If I’m being honest, I thought you would come back long after that, too,” Crow continued. “It wasn’t until I saw you on TV that that hope finally dissolved, and it turned into hate. I hated you for a very long time. Every time the kids talked about you, I had to leave the room.”

               “Did you tell them about…?”

               Crow laughed derisively. “No. You know me, Jack—I don’t try to influence how people feel about others based on my own feelings. I didn’t tell them anything about us, or how I felt about you. They all think you’re a god. And I let them.” His voice broke slightly and he cleared his throat.

               “I’m sorry.”

               Crow shut his eyes hard, feeling tears prick them. _Don’t say that to me._

               “Crow, I am,” Jack pressed, as if he could read his mind. He reached out, then hesitated and brought his hand back to his chest. “I’m so sorry I abandoned you. I should never have done that. I should have stayed—or told you I was leaving, or—”

               “Don’t apologize now!” Crow shouted. His voice echoed off the buildings and off the water. He spun on Jack, drawing back a fist and slamming it into his ribs. Jack gasped, staggering backwards. Crow advanced, his gray eyes wet with tears. “Don’t apologize after four fucking years!” He landed another blow, making Jack grunt and take another step away, holding his hands up to try to defend himself.

               “Crow,” he tried.

               “Don’t act like my feelings would have made a difference!” Crow swung again, but it was less coordinated and merely glanced across Jack’s chest. “Don’t stand there and lie to me and pretend like you gave a rat about what your decisions meant to me!”

               He choked on a sob, his next swing missing entirely. He moved to backhanding his eyes, sniffling. “You left me alone, and I got so used to it and I grew up like that, just myself against the rest of the whole awful world. I was fine with getting arrested again and again, because at—at least then I wasn’t _alone_.”

               “Crow,” Jack whispered. The younger boy pushed him away, stumbling slightly.

               “I hate you,” he choked out, balling his fists and hitting both of them against Jack’s collarbones. Suddenly, they weren’t eighteen and nineteen, they were thirteen and fourteen, and Jack had gotten hurt during a standard training run the Enforcers were doing.

               _“You selfish prick,” Crow cried, hugging him tightly. “You could have died!”_

_“Crow, it was a three-story fall,” Jack insisted, eyes wide. He had broken both ankles and bruised his ribs; nothing serious enough to warrant this reaction._

_“You didn’t even think what we would do without you!” Crow looked up, eyes full of tears, lower lip trembling. “What I would do without you.”_

               Crow fell against Jack’s chest, forehead bowed as he struggled to hold in sobs. “I hate you.”

               “I know.” Jack hesitantly put both hands on Crow’s shoulders, and when he didn’t respond, moved them around his upper body in a tight hug.

               “Asshole.”

               “I know.”

               “Prick.”

               “I know.”

               “Arrogant, selfish douchebag.”

               “I know.”

               Crow’s fists tightened in Jack’s shirt as sobs took over, his whole body shaking. Jack closed his eyes, feeling a couple tears escape down his own cheeks. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered into the redhead’s hair.

               “How dare you,” Crow gasped out. “How dare you still make me care about you.”

               “I know.” Jack smiled despite himself and pressed a kiss to Crow’s temple. “I know.”

               They stood like that for a long time, Jack for once not looking at the city but looking at the boy in his arms. He was suddenly aware of all of his mistakes, and hoped that he could make up for at least one of them.

               “I’m so sorry,” Jack murmured again. “I won’t leave you alone. I promise. You’ll never be alone again.”

               Crow sniffled and muttered something that sounded like ‘ducking glass mole’, and that made Jack smile.

               “I know.”

               The sun was rising over New Domino City.

**Author's Note:**

> So this is in no way, shape, or form my first 5Ds fanfiction. It's like the second one I've published (first was on fanfiction, thinking about crossposting here), though. I just love the idea of Crow and Jack, especially with their dynamic in the show. Plus, there had to be a reason they both left the Enforcers together, huh? ;) but maybe that's just me.
> 
> Reviews are love!


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